Tag: transfers

Trade frictions between the world’s two largest economies go well beyond the parameters of imports and exports. Washington has been attempting to negotiate with Beijing about issues like forced tech transfers and intellectual property theft, but there’s a growing sense among international analysts that talks may also be touching on other deep-rooted issues in their relationship, particularly on the national security and military front. The ongoing spat is a reflection of great power rivalries, p

Trade frictions between the world’s two largest economies go well beyond the parameters of imports and exports.

Washington has been attempting to negotiate with Beijing about issues like forced tech transfers and intellectual property theft, but there’s a growing sense among international analysts that talks may also be touching on other deep-rooted issues in their relationship, particularly on the national security and military front.

The ongoing spat is a reflection of great power rivalries, political scientist Joseph Nye wrote in a Project Syndicate editorial last month: “It is much more than a typical trade dispute like, say, America’s recent clash with Canada over access to that country’s dairy market.”

Many economists have pointed out that the current dispute is more of a tech war than a tariff war as U.S. President Donald Trump’s administration targets China’s technology sector practices. Beijing’s militarization of the South China Sea and the sovereignty of Taiwan could also be influencing negotiations.

It’s something like the German Bundesbank before the monetary union, where no German politician would dare talk about the monetary policy, and where it would be unthinkable that a Buba official would ever publicly urge higher inflation rates. Normally, fiscal and monetary policies must be closely coordinated to deliver a noninflationary policy mix for a steady and sustainable growth. A benign neglect of trade deficits is an equally serious policy blunder. They are wealth transfers to trade partn

Price stability is a precious public good — a situation where investment decisions and contractual relationships are made under assumptions of stable prices, because the monetary authorities are trusted to deliver a stable purchasing power of the currency they manage. It’s something like the German Bundesbank before the monetary union, where no German politician would dare talk about the monetary policy, and where it would be unthinkable that a Buba official would ever publicly urge higher inflation rates.

Fiscal policies are a question of national priorities. The U.S. debt and deficit numbers are clear — and they are not good. Budget constraints must be respected. There is a political and market sanction if they are not. The Fed’s independence also means that it should never validate unreasonable fiscal policy choices. Normally, fiscal and monetary policies must be closely coordinated to deliver a noninflationary policy mix for a steady and sustainable growth.

A benign neglect of trade deficits is an equally serious policy blunder. Those deficits are a subtraction from American GDP. They are wealth transfers to trade partners and sources of American foreign debt because deficits have to be covered by U.S. debt instruments in exchange for foreign savings.

For almost two years, Washington has been in a virtual state of siege because the Chinese, the Japanese and the Europeans don’t care about threats and taunts. Those economies are piling on their U.S. trade surpluses with abandon.

It should not take a dinner on Argentinian beef and a big delegation to convince the Chinese president to do “something” about his soaring U.S. trade surpluses. Xi knows he has a $400 billion trade problem with the U.S., and he knows that he needs to get that down. But Xi has been given a wonderful grace period because he has to negotiate Washington’s requests to stop forced technology transfers, illegal intellectual property acquisitions, illegal export subsidies, etc.

The solution here is simple. Washington should ask Beijing for a prompt reduction of its trade deficit. How China does that is its own choice.

Think it can’t actually be done that way? Well, in the first nine months of this year, South Korea slashed its U.S. trade surplus 22.3 percent, after a 17 percent cut for last year as a whole. That is a respectful gesture of a true friend and ally: A 39.3 percent surplus cut since U.S. President Donald Trump took office.

The others can do that too, but the truth is the Chinese, the Japanese and the Europeans don’t want to do it.

And the U.S. should not leave it to the Chinese to change the structural problems. American companies should be prohibited from allowing forced technology transfers, or other forms of intellectual property thefts. Cyber-enabled thefts should be dealt with appropriate technologies that America has. Bilateral market access and investment practices should be matters of strict reciprocity, or as a Scorsese drama character would put it: “Same to you, fellas.”

Two contentious issues were notably downplayed in the deal between President Donald Trump and President Xi Jinping at the G-20 summit over the weekend: China’s alleged practice of forcing technology transfers and apparent theft of intellectual property from American companies. U.S. concerns over forced technology transfers in China, intellectual property violations and cyber-crime issues will likely become a central focus going forward, as trade negotiations between both countries continue, expe

Two contentious issues were notably downplayed in the deal between President Donald Trump and President Xi Jinping at the G-20 summit over the weekend: China’s alleged practice of forcing technology transfers and apparent theft of intellectual property from American companies.

U.S. concerns over forced technology transfers in China, intellectual property violations and cyber-crime issues will likely become a central focus going forward, as trade negotiations between both countries continue, experts told CNBC on Monday. However, they added, a resolution may not be immediately forthcoming.

Over the weekend in Argentina, the United States and China agreed to put their bilateral trade war on hold for 90 days to negotiate lingering disagreements.

“It is interesting to note that IP/cyber was only mentioned in paragraph four of the White House statement, reflecting Trump’s focus on trade deficits,” Steven Okun, senior advisor at McLarty Associates told CNBC on Monday. “Still, this does not mean this is not core to the U.S. tariffs.”

The trade war is based on the investigations by the Office of the United States Trade Representative (USTR) into China’s intellectual property practices, he said.

Saving money isn’t nearly as fun as spending it, which is why so many of us need tools to keep us on track. One simple trick for getting out of your own way is simply automating the process. I started doing this about a year ago and have saved up $4,400 since. Only 39 percent say they have enough saved up to cover a $1,000 emergency, a Bankrate survey recently found. Meanwhile, 20 percent say they aren’t saving at all.

Saving money isn’t nearly as fun as spending it, which is why so many of us need tools to keep us on track.

One simple trick for getting out of your own way is simply automating the process. Online banking platforms let you schedule regular transfers, meaning you can set an amount to be taken from your checking account and put into your savings without having to think about it.

I started doing this about a year ago and have saved up $4,400 since. (I’m guilty of dipping into it for a trip to Norway I took last fall.) It’s a great start, but I still have a ways to go if I want a sufficient emergency fund, or about three to six months worth of living expenses, according to personal finance experts. For me, the high end of that range adds up to a considerable sum of roughly $10,000.

Most Americans have nowhere near that. Only 39 percent say they have enough saved up to cover a $1,000 emergency, a Bankrate survey recently found. Meanwhile, 20 percent say they aren’t saving at all.

The London, U.K.-headquartered firm specializes in cross-currency money transfers at a lower cost than traditional banks. But TransferWise allows users to transfer money from one currency to another with a fee of around 0.5 percent and at the mid-market exchange rate. TransferWise has around 3 million users transferring 2 billion euros ($2.3 billion) each month, and it is looking to boost its reach through the BPCE partnership. Groupe BPCE is the first major mainstream bank to partner with Trans

TransferWise announced a partnership Monday with France’s Groupe BPCE to offer its low-cost money transfer service to the lender’s customers, marking the first integration of the U.K. start-up’s product with a major bank.

The London, U.K.-headquartered firm specializes in cross-currency money transfers at a lower cost than traditional banks. The process of moving currencies around the world is typically expensive because of a large cut taken by banks and unfavorable exchange rates. But TransferWise allows users to transfer money from one currency to another with a fee of around 0.5 percent and at the mid-market exchange rate.

TransferWise has around 3 million users transferring 2 billion euros ($2.3 billion) each month, and it is looking to boost its reach through the BPCE partnership. BPCE is the second-largest banking group in France. TransferWise will have access to the company’s more than 15 million customers.

The service will be integrated via the group’s banking apps starting in 2019, the companies said in the announcement made at the Money 2020 Europe fintech (financial technology) conference in Amsterdam, Netherlands.

Groupe BPCE is the first major mainstream bank to partner with TransferWise which has typically been seen as a challenger to the incumbents. German start-up bank N26 and Estonia’s LHV have previously partnered with TransferWise.

The European Commission is proposing that EU governments make direct money transfers to Iran’s central bank to avoid U.S. penalties, an EU official said, in what would be the most forthright challenge to Washington’s newly reimposed sanctions. The step, which would seek to bypass the U.S. financial system, would allow European companies to repay Iran for oil exports and repatriate Iranian funds in Europe, a senior EU official said, although the details were still to be worked out. We now need to

The European Commission is proposing that EU governments make direct money transfers to Iran’s central bank to avoid U.S. penalties, an EU official said, in what would be the most forthright challenge to Washington’s newly reimposed sanctions.

The step, which would seek to bypass the U.S. financial system, would allow European companies to repay Iran for oil exports and repatriate Iranian funds in Europe, a senior EU official said, although the details were still to be worked out.

The European Union, once Iran’s biggest oil importer, is determined to save the nuclear accord, that U.S. President Donald Trump abandoned on May 8, by keeping money flowing to Tehran as long as the Islamic Republic complies with the 2015 deal to prevent it from developing an atomic weapon.

“Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker has proposed this to member states. We now need to work out how we can facilitate oil payments and repatriate Iranian funds in the European Union to Iran’s central bank,” said the EU official, who is directly involved in the discussions.

The U.S. Treasury announced on Tuesday more sanctions on officials of the Iranian central bank, including Governor Valiollah Seif. But the EU official said the bloc believes that does not sanction the central bank itself.

China is also building a $50 billion “economic corridor” in Pakistan, connecting Xinjiang to Arabian Sea port cities of Gwadar and Karachi with a network of highways and high-speed rail services. That Arabian Sea access is opening a key lane to China’s strategic locations in the Mediterranean. The most important such point is the Greek port of Piraeus, the largest in South Europe, where China purchased a majority ownership for 280.5 million euros. Along with the North Sea Route to Europe, jointl

China is also building a $50 billion “economic corridor” in Pakistan, connecting Xinjiang to Arabian Sea port cities of Gwadar and Karachi with a network of highways and high-speed rail services. Pakistani ports are supposed to keep open China’s access to the Middle East and Africa — and beyond — in case, as some Chinese strategists fear, the Straits of Malacca are blocked by the U.S. and its allies.

That Arabian Sea access is opening a key lane to China’s strategic locations in the Mediterranean. The most important such point is the Greek port of Piraeus, the largest in South Europe, where China purchased a majority ownership for 280.5 million euros. That creates a springboard for billions of dollars of Chinese investments in high-speed rail connections to Central and Eastern Europe through Macedonia, Serbia and Hungary.

Along with the North Sea Route to Europe, jointly developed with Russia, those are all investments of great strategic importance to China. Closer to home, China also announced a number of similar — dual-use and military — investments last week.

More than 40 space launches are expected this year, including the heavy-lift Long March 5 rocket, far side Moon missions by Chang’e 4 lunar lander and rover, and new Beidou navigation satellites.

The country’s armed forces, funded last year by an officially declared military budget of $215.7 billion, are now primed to get better and to win wars with power projection assets like aircraft carriers. The construction of a third such vessel is currently under way, and a total of four battle groups are planned over the next 10 years.

Let’s stop the litany here to see what all that means for Washington’s dealings with its chief “strategic competitor.”

First, a lesson should be drawn from a dreadfully wrong strategic assessment that promoted investments in China and opened American markets to goods and services from China’s low-cost production facilities on the idea that the Middle Kingdom would soon shake off its Communist ideology to create a “Chimerica” wonderland — a capitalist, U.S.-compatible economic and political ally.

Second, that U.S. policy blunder allowed China to build a readily deployed treasure chest of more than $3 trillion, and an additional $2 trillion in short- and long-term international investments.

Third, the U.S. should stop chasing after China’s global initiatives. That is a useless waste of time and resources. Leave it to American defense experts to protect the country’s security and its vital national interests. They have plenty of money and power projection instruments to do that.

Fourth, stay away from blatant trade protectionism and dumb protectionist rhetoric. Get a smart economic diplomacy by following World Trade Organization- and International Monetary Fund-compatible principles of fair and reciprocal trade to correct systematic (beggar-thy-neighbor) and excessive trade imbalances.

Here is a hypothetical example of what that policy would do if the U.S.-China trade were to be balanced. Taking the trade numbers for the first 11 months of last year, such a trade equilibrium would imply tripling the current U.S. exports to China — if China insisted on exports of $460 billion to the U.S.

The transfers in October and November indicate that smuggling from Russia to North Korea has evolved to loading cargoes at sea since Reuters reported in September that North Korean ships were sailing directly from Russia to their homeland. A second source, who independently confirmed the existence of the Russian ship-to-ship fuel trade with North Korea, said there was no evidence of Russian state involvement in the latest transfers. Russia’s Foreign Ministry and the Russian Customs Service both

Russian tankers have supplied fuel to North Korea on at least three occasions in recent months by transferring cargoes at sea, according to two senior Western European security sources, providing an economic lifeline to the secretive Communist state.

The sales of oil or oil products from Russia, the world’s second biggest oil exporter and a veto-wielding member of the United Nations Security Council, breach U.N. sanctions, the security sources said.

The transfers in October and November indicate that smuggling from Russia to North Korea has evolved to loading cargoes at sea since Reuters reported in September that North Korean ships were sailing directly from Russia to their homeland.

“Russian vessels have made ship-to-ship transfers of petrochemicals to North Korean vessels on several occasions this year in breach of sanctions,” the first security source, who spoke on condition of anonymity, told Reuters.

A second source, who independently confirmed the existence of the Russian ship-to-ship fuel trade with North Korea, said there was no evidence of Russian state involvement in the latest transfers.

“There is no evidence that this is backed by the Russian state, but these Russian vessels are giving a lifeline to the North Koreans,” the second European security source said.

The two security sources cited naval intelligence and satellite imagery of the vessels operating out of Russian Far Eastern ports on the Pacific but declined to disclose further details to Reuters, saying it was classified.

Russia’s Foreign Ministry and the Russian Customs Service both declined to comment when asked on Wednesday if Russian ships had supplied fuel to North Korean vessels. The owner of one ship accused of smuggling oil to North Korea denied any such activity.

The latest report came as China, responding on Friday to criticism from U.S. President Donald Trump, denied it had illicitly shipped oil products to North Korea.

North Korea relies on imported fuel to keep its struggling economy functioning. It also requires oil for its intercontinental ballistic missile and nuclear program that the United States says threatens the peace in Asia.

“The vessels are smuggling Russian fuel from Russian Far Eastern ports to North Korea,” said the first security source, who spoke on condition of anonymity.

Reuters was unable to independently verify that the vessels had transferred fuel to North Korean vessels, whether the Russian state knew about the sales or how many Russian vessels were involved in the transfers. It was also unclear how much fuel may have been smuggled.

Ship satellite positioning data consulted by Reuters and available on Reuters Eikon shows unusual movements by some of the Russian vessels named by the security sources including switching off the transponders which give a precise location.

The security sources said the Russian-flagged tanker Vityaz was one vessel that had transferred fuel to North Korean vessels.

The Vityaz left the port of Slavyanka near Vladivostok in Russia on Oct. 15 with 1,600 tons of oil, according to Russian port control documents.

Documents submitted by the vessel’s agent to the Russian State Port Control authority showed its destination as a fishing fleet in the Japan Sea. Shipping data showed the vessel switched off its transponder for a few days as it sailed into open waters.

According to the European security sources, the Vityaz conducted a ship-to-ship transfer with the North Korean Flagged Sam Ma 2 tanker in open seas during October.

Reuters could not independently verify the transfer as ship tracking data showed that the Sam Ma 2 had turned off its transponder from the start of August.

The owner of the Russian vessel denied any contact with North Korean vessels but also said it was unaware that the vessel was fuelling fishing boats.

Yaroslav Guk, deputy director of the tanker’s owner, Vladivostok-based Alisa Ltd, said the vessel had no contacts with North Korean vessels.

“Absolutely no, this is very dangerous,” Guk told Reuters by telephone. “It would be complete madness.”

When contacted a second time, Guk said the vessel did not have any contacts with North Korean ships and that he would not answer further questions.

An official at East Coast Ltd, the vessel’s transport agent, declined to comment.

Two other Russian flagged tankers made similar journeys between the middle of October and November, leaving from the ports of Slavyanka and Nakhodka into open seas where they switched off their transponders, shipping data showed.

In September, Reuters reported that at least eight North Korean ships that left Russia loaded with fuel this year headed for their homeland despite declaring other destinations, a ploy that U.S. officials say is often used to undermine sanctions.

A Russian shipping source with knowledge of Far Eastern marine practices said North Korean vessels had stopped loading fuel in Russia’s Far Eastern ports but that fuel is delivered at sea by tankers using ship-to-ship transfers, or even by fishing vessels.

China on Friday denied reports it has been illicitly selling oil products to North Korea, after Trump said he was not happy that China had allowed oil to reach the isolated nation.

China’s denial came a day after it blocked a U.S. effort at the United Nations to blacklist six ships Washington believes had engaged in illicit trade with North Korea, a U.N. Security Council diplomat said.

According to documents seen by Reuters this month, the United States had proposed that the U.N. Security Council blacklist 10 ships for illicit trade with North Korea.

It accused the vessels of “conducting illegal ship-to-ship transfers of refined petroleum products to North Korean vessels or illegally transporting North Korean coal to other countries for exports.”

Three North Korean ships among the 10 were blacklisted, along with a Panama-registered vessel.

It’s happening, and fast: The era of the credit card, in which plastic is the standard form of payment, is coming to an end. Now, before you mourn the loss of the old system, you have to admit there are some problems inherent to credit cards. The most glaring of these is that credit cards often aren’t 100 percent secure. Users face issues ranging from hackers and fraud to lost and stolen cards. The cards also aren’t without high fees from financial institutions, and they’re rarely accepted world

It’s happening, and fast: The era of the credit card, in which plastic is the standard form of payment, is coming to an end.

But it isn’t being replaced by cash. Instead, it’s being replaced by a new system, one that involves digital money transfers through smartphones and other devices.

Now, before you mourn the loss of the old system, you have to admit there are some problems inherent to credit cards. The most glaring of these is that credit cards often aren’t 100 percent secure. Users face issues ranging from hackers and fraud to lost and stolen cards.

The cards also aren’t without high fees from financial institutions, and they’re rarely accepted worldwide.

A 30 percent decline in manufacturing jobs over the past 20 years has impacted the middle class especially hard, Dalio said. By way of solution, Dalio advises policymakers, particularly those at the Federal Reserve, to look deeper into statistics when making decisions. Looking at “average” conditions could provide a misleading picture as the concentration of wealth at the top skews the numbers. He appears, however, to reject the universal basic income proposal advocated by some prominent busines

The top bracket is advancing faster than the bottom because it can spend more on education and is more adaptable to the changes technology is making in the job market. A 30 percent decline in manufacturing jobs over the past 20 years has impacted the middle class especially hard, Dalio said.

“While conditions for the lowest income groups have long been bad, conditions of non-college-educated whites (especially males) have deteriorated significantly over the past 30 years or so,” Dalio said. “This is the group that swung most strongly to help elect President Trump.”

By way of solution, Dalio advises policymakers, particularly those at the Federal Reserve, to look deeper into statistics when making decisions. The Fed is in the midst of plans to enact gradual but steady interest rate increases and to reduce the $4.5 trillion portfolio of bonds the central bank holds.

Looking at “average” conditions could provide a misleading picture as the concentration of wealth at the top skews the numbers. Instead, he advises a closer look at the plight of the middle class.

“Because the economic, social, and political consequences of an economic downturn would likely be severe, if I were running Fed policy, I would want to take this into consideration and keep an eye on the economy of the bottom 60%,” Dalio wrote. “By monitoring what is happening in the economies of both the bottom 60% and the top 40% (or, even better, more granular groups), policy makers and the rest of us can give consideration to the implications of this issue.”

His solution is “some mix of a) directing resources so that they are used productively to generate more than enough income or savings in order to pay for themselves and b) productive wealth transfers appears inevitable.”

He appears, however, to reject the universal basic income proposal advocated by some prominent business people, including Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg. Dalio said “giving money to be used for consumption” will merely “diminish the value of money and not increase the size of the pie.”